Multi-point OFDM/DMT digital communications system including remote service unit with improved receiver architecture

Abstract

A multi-point communications system is set forth. The communications system comprises a primary transmitter disposed at a primary site and a plurality of receivers respectively disposed at a plurality of secondary sites. The primary transmitter generates OFDM/DMT transmissions over a first number of transmission bins to transmit communication data in those bins. A transmission medium is used for transmitting the OFDM/DMT transmissions from the primary transmitter at the primary site to the plurality of receivers disposed at a plurality of secondary sites. Each of the plurality of receivers employs a unique receiver architecture that digitally processes exclusively a reduced subset of the first number of bins transmitted by the primary transmitter to recover communication data that is transmitted in the reduced subset of the first number of bins. Such a receiver architecture eliminates much of the complexity typically associated with receiving and processing a wide-band OFDM/DMT signal, thereby making the communications system subject to economical and practical implementation in applications having receivers respectively located at a large number of secondary sites.

Description

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present invention is directed to a remote service unit for use in an OFDM/DMT digital communications system. More particularly, the present invention is directed to an improved receiver architecture for use in a remote service unit of a multipoint, OFDM/DMT digital communications system.

BACKGROUND

Multi-point communications systems having a primary site that is coupled for communication with a plurality of secondary sites are known. One such communications system type is a cable telephony system. Cable telephony systems transmit and receive telephone call communications over the same cable transmission media as used to receive cable television signals and other cable services.

One cable telephony system currently deployed and in commercial use is the Cablespan 2300 system available from Tellabs, Inc. The Cablespan 2300 system uses a head end unit that includes a primary transmitter and primary receiver disposed at a primary site. The head end unit transmits and receives telephony data to and from a plurality of remote service units that are located at respective secondary sites. This communication scheme uses TDM QPSK modulation for the data communications and can accommodate approximately thirty phone calls within the 1.9 MHz bandwidth typically allocated for such communications.

As the number of cable telephony subscribers increases over time, the increased use will strain the limited bandwidth allocated to the cable telephony system. Generally stated, there are two potential solutions to this bandwidth allocation problem that may be used separately or in conjunction with one another. First, the bandwidth allocated to cable telephony communications may be increased. Second, the available bandwidth may be used more efficiently. It is often impractical to increase the bandwidth allocated to the cable telephony system given the competition between services for the total bandwidth assigned to the cable service provider. Therefore, it is preferable to use the allocated bandwidth in a more efficient manner. One way in which the allocated bandwidth may be used more efficiently is to use a modulation scheme that is capable of transmitting more information within a given bandwidth than the TDM QPSK modulation scheme presently employed.

The present inventors have recognized that OFDM/DMT modulation schemes may provide such an increase in transmitted information for a given bandwidth. U.S. Pat. No. 5,539,777, issued Jul. 23, 1996, purports to disclose a DMT modulation scheme for use in a communications system. The system principally focuses on applications in which a single secondary site includes a plurality of differing receiver and transmitter devices. The transmitters and receivers used at the secondary site of the system described therein, however, are quite complex and require a substantial amount of processing power. As such, the system disclosed in the '777 patent does not readily or economically lend itself to multi-point communications systems in which there are a large number of secondary sites each having at least one receiver.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

A multi-point communications system is set forth that is particularly useful in communications applications in which there are a number of remote secondary sites each requiring at least one receiver. The communications system comprises a primary transmitter disposed at a primary site and a plurality of receivers respectively disposed at a plurality of secondary sites. The primary transmitter generates OFDM/DMT transmissions over a first number of transmission bins to transmit communication data in those bins. A transmission medium is used for transmitting the OFDM/DMT transmissions from the primary transmitter at the primary site to the plurality of receivers disposed at a plurality of secondary sites. Each of the plurality of receivers employs a unique receiver architecture that digitally processes exclusively a reduced subset of the first number of bins transmitted by the primary transmitter to recover communication data that is transmitted in the reduced subset of the first number of bins. Such a receiver architecture eliminates much of the complexity typically associated with receiving and processing a wide-band OFDM/DMT signal, thereby making the communications system subject to economical and practical implementation in applications having receivers respectively located at a large number of secondary sites.

Each of the plurality of receivers may comprise a first circuit for converting the analog OFDM/DMT transmissions received from the transmitter of the primary site into digital data and a second circuit for processing the digital data output of the first circuit to extract frequency, amplitude, and phase information from the digital data. A third circuit is provided for limiting the digital data processed by the second circuit to a second number of transmission bins, the second number of transmission bins being a reduced subset of the first number of transmission bins transmitted by the transmitter of the primary site.

The third circuit referenced above may be constructed in several ways. For example, the third circuit may comprise an analog-to-digital converter disposed in the first circuit for converting the analog OFDM/DMT transmissions to the digital data at a sampling frequency which results in aliasing of the digital data characteristics to thereby reduce the number of digital data samples processed by the second circuit. As a further example, the third circuit may comprise a band pass filter disposed in the first circuit for limiting the number of bins that are converted to generate the digital data to a subset of the first number of bins of the OFDM/DMT transmissions. Without limitation, one or both of these data reduction techniques can be employed within a single receiver.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a schematic block diagram of a multi-point communications system having a plurality of remote service units disposed at a plurality of secondary sites wherein each of the remote service units comprises a receiver having an improved receiver architecture.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of illustrative embodiments of the head end unit and a remote service unit of the communications system of FIG. 1.

FIG. 3 illustrates two symbol constellations that are transmitted in two separate frequency bins in accordance with OFDM/DMT data modulation techniques.

FIGS. 4 and 5 illustrate exemplary bandwidth allocations for the local cable system and the cable telephony system, respectively.

FIGS. 6-8 illustrate various embodiments of the receiver of the remote service unit at various levels of detail.

FIGS. 9-11 illustrate various embodiments of the transmitter of the remote service unit at various levels of detail.

FIGS. 12-14 illustrate one way in which the head end unit and a newly added remote service unit can initialize communications.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERED EMBODIMENT

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a multi-point communications system which may use a remote service unit having the improved receiver and transmitter architectures disclosed herein. As illustrated, the communications system, shown generally at 20 includes a head end unit (HE) 25 disposed at a primary site. The head end unit communicates with a plurality of remote service units (RSUs) 30 respectively disposed at a plurality of secondary sites, over a transmission medium 35 such as a coaxial cable.

The digital communications system 20 may, for example, be a cable telephony system. In such an application, the head end unit 25 is disposed at a cable television transmission facility while the remote service units 30 are disposed at individual customer locations, such as individual customer homes. The transmission medium 35 would be the new or existing transmission cable used to transmit the cable television services. The head end unit 25 in a cable telephony network is responsible for communicating with and interconnecting telephone calls between the plurality of remote service units 30 as well communicating with a central switching office 40 for sending and receiving telephone calls from sites exterior to the local cable television service area.

A block diagram of one embodiment of a head end unit 25 and a remote service unit 30 is shown in FIG. 2. As illustrated, the head end unit 25 and the remote service units 30 each generally comprise respective baseband sections 45, 50 and respective RF sections 55, 60. The baseband section 45 of the head end unit 25 receives constellation data at one or more lines 65 and performs an Inverse Fast Fourier Transform on the received data. The transformed signal is modulated within the RF section 55 for transmission along the cable transmission 35. The remote service units 30 receive the RF modulated data from the cable transmission medium 35 in the respective RF section. The received signal is demodulated within the RF section 60 of the remote service unit 30 and the resulting signal is supplied to the baseband section 50 which performs a Fourier Transform on the signal to recover the data transmitted by the head end unit 25. The recovered data is supplied from the baseband section 50 along one or more lines 70 for further decoding. As is apparent from the block diagram of FIG. 2, constellation data may also be received at one or more lines 75 of the baseband section 50 of the remote receiving unit 30. The received data undergoes an Inverse Fourier Transformation or, more preferably, a direct sequence transformation and the resulting signal is RF modulated for transmission along the cable transmission medium 35 for receipt by the head end unit 25. The head end unit 25 demodulates the received signal in the RF section 55 and performs a Fast Fourier Transform on the demodulated signal to recover the transmitted data and provide it on one or more lines 80 for further decoding.

The present system 20 utilizes OFDM/DMT digital data modulation for exchanging communications data between the head end unit 25 and the remote service units 30. Such OFDM/DMT digital data communications assign a particular amplitude, frequency, and phase for each transmitted "sub-symbol". The transmitted "sub-symbol" represents one or more information data bits that are to be transmitted between the units 25 and 30. Each sub-symbol may be represented by a point within a "constellation", the point being transmitted at a given carrier frequency or "bin". FIG. 3 illustrates the use of two constellations 90 and 95, each having sixteen constellation points that are capable of being transmitted within two separate frequency bins. As illustrated, a sub-symbol having a carrier signal of frequency f1 has its amplitude and phase varied depending on the constellation point that is to be transmitted. For example, a constellation point representing the binary states 0000 is transmitted as a sub-symbol at a phase of θ₂ and an amplitude of A₁ during a designated symbol time. A constellation point representing the binary states 1111, however, is transmitted as a sub-symbol at a phase of θ₂ and an amplitude of A₂ during a designated symbol time. Similarly, the second constellation 95, preferably having the same amplitude and phase designations for its sub-symbols as the first constellation 90, is used to modulate a second carrier frequency f2. The resulting modulated signals are combined into a single output symbol in which the individual sub-symbols are differentiated from one another based on their respective carrier frequencies or "bins". It will be recognized that many variations of the disclosed OFDM/DMT transmission scheme are possible, the foregoing scheme being merely illustrated herein to provide a basic understanding of OFDM/DMT communications.

Referring to FIG. 4 there is shown an exemplary break-up of the bandwidth allocated to a local cable television service. As illustrated, the entire allocated bandwidth is further sub-allocated into smaller bandwidth portions for the transmission of selected services such as cable television, audio broadcasting, cable telephony, and other miscellaneous services. The bandwidth allocated for cable telephony constitutes the focus of further discussion. However, it will be recognized that the digital communications system described herein can be utilized in any multi-point digital data communications system.

FIG. 5 illustrates the bandwidth allocated, for example, to the cable telephony communications. Without limitation, the bandwidth of the exemplary embodiment may be about 2 MHz with a center frequency of about 600 MHz. As shown, the bandwidth is divided into a plurality of frequency bins 100, each bin carrying a sequence of subsymbols corresponding to the data that is to be communicated. The head end unit 35 sends and receives data to and from multiple remote service units 30 and must be capable of processing substantially all, if not all of the bins allocated to cable telephony transmission. Accordingly, the head end unit 25 must have a substantial amount of processing power. Such a high amount of processing power naturally gives rise to increased production, maintenance, and power costs. Similarly, the remote service units 30 require substantial processing power if they are to each process the entire bandwidth or number of bins allocated to the cable telephony communications and transmitted by the head end unit 25.

The present inventors, however, have recognized that many applications using multi-point, OFDM/DMT data communications do not require that the remote service units 30 process the entire number of bins transmitted by the transmitter at the primary site. Rather, as recognized by the present inventors, the remote service units 30 employed in many types of OFDM/DMT data communications systems, such as cable telephony systems, need only be capable of processing a limited number of bins of the entire number of bins transmitted by the head end unit 25.

Based on this recognition, the remote service units 30 are designed to process substantially fewer bins than the entire number of bins transmitted by the head end unit 25. More particularly, the receiver architecture of each RSU is particularly adapted to exclusively digitally process only a limited number of bins of the larger number of OFDM/DMT bins that are transmitted by the head end unit 25. Remote service units 30 disposed at different secondary sites are preferably designed to process different subsets of bins. More preferably, the particular subsets of bins processed by any remote service units is dependent on command transmissions received from the head end unit 25.

Such a receiver architecture has several advantages. For example, the digital signal processing capability required by the receiver of each RSU is significantly reduced thereby making each RSU more economical to design, manufacture, and maintain. Additionally, each RSU consumes less power than would otherwise be required if each RSU had to process the complete number of bins sent by the head end unit 25.

FIG. 6 is a schematic block diagram of one embodiment of a receiver 110 suitable for use in the remote service units 30. As illustrated, the exemplary embodiment is comprised of five functional sections: an RF conversion section 115, an IF-to-digital conversion section 120, a Fourier Transform section 125, a decoding and framing section 130, and a timing and control logic section 140.

The RF conversion section 115 receives the RF signal from the transmission medium 35 through, for example, a splitter, and transposes the desired part of the OFDM/DMT spectrum containing the information that is to be recovered into a predetermined intermediate frequency (IF) pass band. As will be readily recognized, and as will be set forth in further detail below, the RF conversion is achieved with a combination of mixers, filters, and frequency synthesizers.

The IF-to-digital section 120 is used to sample the IF analog signal output of the RF conversion section 115 and provide a digital output signal corresponding to fewer than all of the bins transmitted by the head end unit 25. The resulting digital output signal can thus be processed by the Fourier Transform section 125 using substantially less processing power than would otherwise be required to process the full number of bins. The desired output signal is achieved by band pass filtering the signal to provide a signal that comprises a subset of the original OFDM/DMT bins transmitted by the head end unit 25. This filtered signal is then under-sampled such that the desired signal folds down to near base band via an aliasing process. Under-sampling permits the use of a lower frequency A-to-D conversion than would otherwise be required. Additionally, the under sampling reduces the number of digital samples that are generated, thereby reducing the amount of processing power required in subsequent digital processing steps in the Fourier Transform section 125.

It will be recognized, however, that under sampling is not the only choice for reducing the number of digital samples that are generated to the subsequent sections. For example, a mixer could be used to mix the filtered signal to base band thereby reducing the sampling frequency required to properly sample the received signal. This too would allow one to take advantage of the reduced bin receiver to reduce speed, complexity, and power usage of the system.

The Fourier Transform section 125 is used to take the Fourier transform of the sampled signal output from the IF-to-digital section 120 in order to obtain a frequency domain representation of the OFDM/DMT modulated signal. This can be achieved in any one of multiple ways. First, the Fourier Transform section 125 may include a digital signal processor that performs a Fourier Transform on the sampled data. However, unlike ordinary OFDM/DMT digital communications which perform a Fast Fourier Transform over all the bins sent by the transmitter at the primary site, the Fourier Transform implemented by the presently disclosed receiver 110 is taken over a reduced number of bins. This results in significant cost and power savings. A further improvement can be achieved in the case where the sampled signal received from the IF-to-digital section 120 contains more bins than any individual receiver needs to receive. In this case, a hardware correlator could be used to obtain a Fourier Transform of only the bin frequencies containing data that the receiver 110 is to recover. This permits further power and complexity reduction when the narrow band receive window is still somewhat larger than the needed bandwidth. Furthermore, this architecture allows the speed and power consumption to be scaled according to the number of bins any particular receiver needs to receive.

It will be recognized that an FFT can be performed on the reduce subset of received bins yet still reap the advantages inherent in the disclosed receiver architecture. This is due to the fact that the FFT can be implemented using a digital signal processor of reduced complexity when compared to an FFT processing the entire bandwidth transmitted by the head end unit 25.

The decoding and formatting section 130 receives the processed output of the Fourier Transform section 125 and converts the received frequency domain constellation points into the corresponding data they represent thereby completing the recovery of the transmitted data. The decoding and formatting section 130 also performs any error correction, digital equalization, slicing to bits, framing, and descrambling that is required. Such decoding and formatting, as is readily recognized, is dependent on the framing and formatting used by the head end unit 25 in transmitting the data and may take on any form.

It is worth noting that phase compensation can be implemented in the decoding and formatting section 130 to compensate for any differences between the mixing frequencies of the transmitter of the head end unit 25 and the mixing frequencies of the receiver of the remote service unit 30. Such phase compensation can be implemented by effectively rotating the phase of each received sub-symbol through a predetermined phase angle θ₃ during each symbol period. As such, the phase angle through which each sub-symbol is rotated is a multiple of θ₃. For example, a first sub-symbol during a first symbol period T1 is rotated by phase angle θ₃ while the next sub-symbol received during a subsequent second symbol period T2 is rotated by a phase angle equal to 2* θ₃.

The output from the decoding and formatting section 130 is supplied to the input of one or both of an analog-to-digital section 132 and direct digital section 137. The analog-to-digital section 132 converts the digital information received from the decoding and formatting section 130 to an analog signal that may be supplied to various analog devices. The direct digital section 137 provides an interface between the digital signal output of the decoding and formatting section 130 and any digital data devices.

A centralized timing and control block 140 is used in the illustrated embodiment to provide the timing and control signals required to coordinate the operation of the other processing sections. It will be recognized, however, that this timing and control function may also be performed in a decentralized way, wherein each of the individual processing sections 115, 120,125, and 130 contain or share individual timing and control circuitry. However, in such instances, additional synchronization circuitry dealing with the resulting asynchronous nature of the clocks in the individual sections may be required. Such a decentralized architecture could also require more pipelining with its associated memory.

FIG. 7 illustrates one manner in which the RF section 115, the IF-to-digital section 120, and a portion of the Fourier Transform section 125 can be implemented. As shown, the signal transmitted from the head end unit 25 is received by a first bandpass filter 150 that, for example, has a wide pass band with end frequencies of about 470 MHz and 750 MHz. The signal from the bandpass filter 150 is supplied to the input of a tuner 155 that has its characteristics determined by the output of a tuner synthesizer 160 that is tied to receive the output of a reference clock that, for example, has a clock frequency of about 4 MHz. Without limitation, the tuner 155 mixes the signal from the bandpass filter 150 to a signal having a frequency of about 240 MHz. The output of the tuner 155 is supplied to the input of a further filter 165, a SAW filter in the illustrated embodiment. The output of SAW filter 165 is supplied to an IF mixer 170 that transposes the signal to an intermediate frequency (IF) of, for example, 10.7 MHz. The mixer 170 performs the IF conversion by mixing the signal received from the SAW filter 165 with the signal generated by oscillator 175. The signal generated by the oscillator 175 is synchronized to the reference clock signal received on line 180.

The received signal, now converted to the IF band, is subsequently supplied to the input of an IF bandpass filter 185 that, for example, has a 300 KHz bandwidth and a center frequency of about 10.7 MHz. The output of the bandpass filter 185 is an OFDM/DMT modulated signal having only a subset of the entire number of bins transmitted by the head end unit 25. One or both of the filters 165 and 185, however, may be used to reduce the bandwidth of the received signal so as to limit the number of bins that are ultimately processed. The filtered IF signal is converted to a digital signal by an A/D converter 190 that has its conversion clock on line 195 synchronized to the reference clock on line 180 through a clock dividing circuit 200. As noted above, the conversion clock frequency may be selected to be low enough to result in undersampling of the IF signal thereby reducing the number of samples supplied at the A/D converter 190 output. An increased in the sampling rate, however, can be used to compensate for any inexactness of filters 170 and/or 185.

The output of the A/D converter 190 is supplied to the input of a digital signal processing circuit 205 that generates the Fourier Transform of the signal that it receives, extracts the received symbols based on the Fourier Transform information, and performs any other processing functions required. In a cable telephony system, the output of the digital processing circuit 205 may be supplied to the inputs of one or more D/A converters or CODECs that convert the data contained in the received symbols to one or more analog output signals, such as audio voice signals, that can be heard by a person engaged in a telephone conversation.

FIG. 8 illustrates one embodiment of a hardware correlator 210 that may be used in the Fourier Transform section 125. The illustrated hardware correlator 210 is designed to correlate nine frequency bins within the total bandwidth of frequency bins that are provided in digital format at the output of the A/D converter 190 of, for example, the IF-to-digital circuit 120. The correlator 210 includes a multiplier section 215, a frequency generator section 220, and an accumulator section 225. As shown, the multiplier section 215 receives the digital data that is output from the IF-to-digital section 125 and multiplies each value by the sine and cosine value of each of the nine frequency bins. The sine and cosine values are supplied as inputs to the multiplier 215 from the frequency generator section 220. The frequency generator section 220 includes a step-size register 225 that includes, in the present embodiment, nine register locations that are programmed by a microcontroller or digital signal processor. The values stored in the step-size register 225 are used to determined the step-size of the addresses supplied to address the data in a cosine table ROM 230, shown here has a quarter wave cosine table. An address modifier circuit 235 receives the address data from the address register 240 and modifies the data so that the address data supplied to the cosine table ROM 230 falls within an acceptable range of addresses and thereby accesses the proper portion of the wave. A sine/cosine bit is supplied from, for example, the timing and control circuit 140 so that each value received from the IF-to-digital converter 125 is multiplied by both the sine and cosine values of each of the nine frequency bins. The data resulting from the multiplication operation are accumulated in the accumulator section 225 and output to the decoder/ formatting section 130 for further processing.

One embodiment of a transmitter suitable for use in the remote service units 30 is illustrated in FIG. 9. The transmitter, shown generally at 300 transmits its digital data in an OFDM/DMT modulated format using a number of bins that is less than the number of bins transmitted and received by the head end unit 25. Accordingly, the transmitter 300 can generate the OFDM/DMT transmission output by modulated direct digital synthesis.

The transmitter 300 of the illustrated embodiment is designed to accept both analog and digital signal information for OFDM/DMT transmission. Accordingly, the transmitter 300 includes an analog-to-digital interface unit 305 and a direct digital interface unit 310. The analog-to-digital interface unit 305 is used to sample an analog signal, such as a voice signal of a person engaged in a telephone conversation, and convert it to digital data to be transmitted. For example, the analog-to-digital interface unit 305 may contain CODECs and SLICs for connecting one or more telephones to the system.

The direct digital interface unit 310 interfaces with any type of device that provides a signal that is already in digital format. For example, the direct digital interface unit 310 might have a serial interface for receiving data, as in a modem application. The unit 310 might also receive data from a system CPU to be sent to the receiver of the head end unit 25.

The transmitter 300 also includes a data interface unit 315. The data interface unit 315 receives data from any combination of the following: sampled analog data from the output of the analog-digital interface unit 305, direct digital data from the output of the direct digital interface unit 310, or other digital data sources that, for example, provide system communication information generated from within or without the data interface unit 315. The data interface unit 315 formats the data received from these data sources into a single data stream. Tasks such as data framing, scrambling, error correction coding, CRC generation, data synchronization, and stuffing may be performed by the data interface unit 315 as part of the formatting function. Optionally, the data interface unit 315 may group the data into words that represent the unique constellation points to be transmitted. As will be readily recognized, the specific formatting operations executed by the data interface unit 315 are dependent on the particular requirements of the communications system in which the remote service unit 30 is employed.

The serial data stream output from the data interface unit 315 is supplied to the input of the transmit engine circuit 320. The data that the transmit engine circuit 320 receives includes one constellation point for each OFDM/DMT bin of the reduced set of bins that is active during a single symbol time. The transmit engine circuit 320 is responsible for calculating the Inverse Fourier Transform on the data stream that is to be modulated and for producing a time domain sequence for each symbol along with any cyclic prefix. Generally, systems using OFDM/DMT modulation performs this function using an IFFT that is implemented, for example, with a digital signal processor. However in a multi-point application, such as the communication system disclosed herein, only a limited number of the possible frequencies or bins are used by each secondary transmitter. Given that only a portion of the total available transmission bandwidth is utilized, the disclosed secondary transmitter architecture is more efficient and cost-effective.

In the preferred embodiment of the transmit engine circuit 320, the time domain sequence is generated by modulated direct digital synthesis, sample by sample. In addition to reducing the complexity of the transmitter, this operation reduces system latency. The time domain sequence for a given symbol is created by generating sine waves, sample by sample, and adding them together. The frequency determines the bin in which the data will be received. The phase and amplitude are used to convey the data intelligence.

Additionally, the preferred embodiment of the system is such that there are 256 bins between 0 Hz and the Nyquist frequency. This is typical in OFDM/DMT systems. That is, the spectrum between 0 Hz and the Nyquist frequency is divided into a number of bins wherein the number is a power of 2, i.e. 2ⁿ where n is an integer. This facilitates the use of FFTs and IFFTs . However, the presently disclosed transmitter 300 preferably uses a Nyquist frequency that is greater than the transmit bandwidth, thereby leaving a number of bins turned off on each edge. Such a transmission scheme provides a natural filtering effect at the edges of the bandwidth. In the preferred embodiment, 209 bins fit within the allocated transmit bandwidth. An additional eight bins are turned off on either end of that bandwidth to leave some transition bandwidth for filters.

Optionally, the transmitter 300 may utilize a digital filter 325 that receives the output of the transmit engine circuit 320. This optional filter performs any desired digital filtering of the output stream and, for example, may be useful in further limiting the bandwidth of the signal.

The digital sequence output from either the digital filter 325 or the transmit engine circuit 320 is supplied to the input of a digital-to-baseband converter or a digital-to-IF converter 330 depending on whether the signal output is at an IF or at baseband. The converter 330 includes components that perform digital-to-analog conversion and analog filtering. If the output is at an IF, a bandpass filter centered around any image of the output spectrum may be employed. This results in an IF signal that is more easily processed in subsequent operations.

The output of the converter 330 is supplied to the input of an RF frequency converter 335. The RF frequency converter 335 shifts the OFDM/DMT spectrum from IF or baseband to the desired RF frequency. As will be readily recognized, the RF frequency converter 335 may be implemented using a combination of mixers, filters, and frequency synthesizers to implement the conversion functions and provides an OFDM/DMT output that is suitable for transmission along the transmission medium.

Timing and control of the transmitter system 300 is provided by a common timing and control logic circuit 340. A centralized timing and control circuit 340 is used in the illustrated embodiment. This function, however, could also be performed in a decentralized way. If decentralized timing and control are utilized, the timing and control circuits would likely be more complex to deal with the resulting lack of synchronism between circuits. It could also require more pipelining with its associated memory.

One embodiment of digital transmission circuitry that may be used to generate the digital OFDM/DMT signal for subsequent D/A conversion and RF modulation is set forth in FIG. 10. The digital transmission circuitry 350 illustrated here may be used to implement, inter alia, the transmit engine circuit 320 of FIG. 9. The digital transmission circuitry 350 accepts digital data from, for example, the output of first and second CODECs respectively associated with individual first and second telephones. Additionally, the circuitry 350 may receive digital data that is to be transmitted in embedded control channels within the transmitted signal, each of the embedded control channels being respectively associated with one of the first and second telephones. The digital data output from the CODECs and on the embedded control channels are combined together by a combiner circuit 360 into two separate data groups, illustrated here as DATA1 and DATA2. The presently disclosed embodiment provides the capability of generating OFDM/DMT transmissions in one or more of nine frequency bins.

Each data group DATAL and DATA2 is supplied to the input of an encoder logic circuit 365. The encoder logic circuit 365 divides the data groups into symbol groups and maps each symbol to a point of a constellation to obtain a phase and amplitude for each symbol. The amplitude information for each symbol is provided on one or more lines 370, while the phase information for each symbol is provided on one or more lines 375.

Generation of the desired frequency and phase for each symbol takes place through the interrelated operation of the start address selection ROM 380, the step size selection register 385, adder 390, address register 395, address modifier 400, and sine table ROM 405. The sine table ROM 405 contains the digital data representation of a sine wave, or selected portion thereof, shown here as a quarter wave table, in successive addressable memory locations. The successive, addressable memory locations of the sine table ROM 405 are addressed in a specific manner to provide a digital output signal having the phase and frequency characteristics of the symbol that it is to represent. The phase of the sine wave represented by the digital output signal is dependent on the memory location that is first addressed at the beginning of the symbol period while the frequency of the sine wave is determined by the rate at which successive memory locations within the sine table ROM 405 are addressed.

The selection of the memory location that is first addressed at the beginning of a symbol period is dependent on the phase information on output lines 375 of the encoder logic circuit 365. The phase information is supplied to the start address ROM 380 which provides a start address which is output to the address storage register 395. The step size through which the memory locations within the sine table ROM 405 are to be cycled is determined by the value at the output of the step size storage register 385.

The step size storage register 385 includes one or more memory storage locations that are accessible to a microcontroller or DSP. The microcontroller determines the step sizes that are stored in the step size storage register 385 based on the desired symbol carrier frequency bins that can be used--the larger the step size, the higher the carrier frequency. In the illustrated embodiment, the step size register 385 includes nine register locations for the nine bins that can be transmitted. Preferably, the step size register 385 is programmed by the microcontroller based on commands received from the head end unit 25. The step size value is supplied at one or more output lines 410 of the step size register 385 to the input of the adder 390. The adder 390 functions to provide the address signals that are used to successively address the memory locations of the sine table ROM 405. Accordingly, the output of the address register 395 is fed back to the input of the adder 390 so that the sine table ROM 405 selection address is incremented by the appropriate step size on each successive addressing cycle corresponding to the particular frequency bins.

Since the sine table ROM 405 of the present embodiment only contains a portion of a single sine wave, an address modifier 400 is used. The address modifier 400 includes combinatorial and/or programmed logic circuits that perform calculations that ensure that the address value supplied to the sine table ROM 405 falls within an acceptable range and thereby accesses the appropriate portion of the wave. Such calculations ensure that the newly calculated address starts at the appropriate portion of the sine table ROM 405 without generating an undesired discontinuity.

The output of the sine table ROM 405 is supplied to the input of a multiplier 420. The multiplier 420 accepts each digital data value that is output from the sine table ROM 405 and multiplies each value by the corresponding amplitude factor as determined from the amplitude information output of the encoder logic circuit 365 received along lines 370.

Since the sine table ROM 405 of the presently disclosed embodiment includes only positive values, some circuitry must be provided to generate the negative portions of the wave. To this end, the output of the multiplier 420 is supplied to a two's complement converter 430 and the most significant bit (MSB) from the address register 395 is used to signal the converter 430 to either through-connect the output of the multiplier 420 to an accumulator 440 or perform a two's complement operation on the output before providing it to the accumulator 440. The accumulator 440 adds all of the data points for the nine frequency bins that are generated during a single sample period and provides the resulting data on output lines 445.

As will be readily recognized, the timing and control inputs from the timing and control logic circuitry 340 are not illustrated in FIG. 10. Such inputs have been omitted in order to simplify the figure. Given the foregoing description, the timing and control operations can be readily derived.

FIG. 11 shows yet a further embodiment of the basic elements of the transmit engine shown in FIG. 10. In the embodiment of FIG. 11, a full wave sine table ROM 500 is utilized. Accordingly, the two's complement circuit 430 and the address modifier 400 are not provided.

Although not particularly pertinent to the improved receiver architecture disclosed herein, FIGS. 12-14 illustrate one manner of initiating communications between a newly added or powered-up remote service unit 30 and the head end unit 25. As shown at step 590, the remote service unit 30 first synchronizes its internal clocks with the head end unit 25. One way in which this may be accomplished can be described with reference to FIG. 2 which shows a pilot tone added by the head end unit 25 to a predetermined bin output that is transmitted to the remote service units 30. The pilot tone is extracted from the received signal by the receiver of the remote service unit 30 and used, for example, as a reference signal for a phase-locked-loop circuit 600. The output of the phase-locked-loop 600 is provided to the input of a voltage controlled oscillator 605 which generates the reference clock for the remote service unit 30.

After the clock synchronization of step 590 is completed, the remote service unit 30 acquires its symbol timing at step 610. One way in which symbol timing may be acquired is illustrated in FIG. 13 which shows an impulse signal 615 being added by the head end unit 25 to the cyclic prefix CP of each symbol transmission. Preferably, the impulse signal 615 reverses polarity with each successive symbol transmission so that a positive polarity impulse signal is added to the cyclic prefix of one symbol transmission while a negative polarity impulse signal is added to the cyclic prefix of the subsequent symbol transmission.

The receiver 110 of the remote service unit 30 finds the time location of the transmitted impulse signal by sampling, at a predetermined rate, the symbols that it receives and alternately adding and subtracting the samples of individual sample periods over several symbol periods. For example, the receiver 110 may sample the received signal at a rate of 100 samples per symbol period to generate samples SAO . . . SA99 during a first symbol period, SB0. . . SB99 samples that it receives during a subsequent symbol period, SC0 ... SC99 samples that it receives during a subsequent third symbol period, and so on. A first sum Y0 is generated from the first sample period of each sampled symbol period in accordance with Y0=SA0-SB0+SC0 . . . . Similar sums are generated for each of the sample periods through Y99 and the resulting sums are analyzed to determined where the peak amplitude occurs in the sampled symbol period. The time position of the peak amplitude corresponds to the time position of the added impulse signal and, thus, the time position of the cyclic prefix occurring at the beginning of each transmitted symbol. The receiver 110 can then make the requisite adjustments to ensure that it receives the symbols in proper alignment.

Once the receiver 110 has acquired downstream symbol alignment, the system proceeds to step 615 where it acquires the downstream communications channel. The downstream communications channel comprises one or more bins used by the head end unit to establish initial communications with receivers 110.

After the receiver 110 has acquired the downstream communications channel, setup of the remote service unit communications proceeds to step 620. At step 620, the newly added or newly powered-up remote service unit 30 must inform the head end unit 25 that it is in need of registration whereby, among other things, the head end unit 25 allocates bins to the receiver and transmitter of the remote service unit 30. One problem associated with any initial transmission from the remote service unit 30 to the head end unit 25 is that the transmit boundary of the newly added remote service unit is not aligned with the transmit boundary of the other remote service units on the system. Thus, any misaligned transmission from the newly added remote service unit may corrupt the transmissions received from other remote service units.

One way of overcoming the problem of initial misalignment is illustrated in FIG. 14. To overcome the problem, a predetermined upstream bin is allocated as an upstream multi-access channel. The transmitter of the newly added remote service unit transmits information on the upstream multi-access channel in the illustrated manner by altering both its transmit phase and transmit power. As shown, the newly added remote service unit first maintains its transmit phase at a predetermined phase while gradually increasing the transmit power. The head end unit 25 can receive such a signal without a corresponding corruption of the data transmitted from the other remote service units. Once the head end unit 25 detects the transmission from the newly added remote service unit, it can perform any requisite processing of the received signal, such as equalization thereof. After a predetermined period of time has elapsed, the newly added remote service unit begins to slowly vary the phase of its transmitted signal in the illustrated manner. The transmit phase is varied so as to convey intelligent data to the head end unit 25. Accordingly, the head end unit 25 samples the phase of the signal that it receives on the upstream multi-access channel and uses the data, for example, to identify the newly added remote service unit.

After the newly added remote service unit has been identified by the head end unit 25, the head end unit 25 commands the newly added remote service unit, via the downstream communications channel, to send, for example, an impulse signal of a predetermined amplitude on the upstream communications channel at the symbol rate. Using the same basic method described above in connection with the remote service unit, the head end unit 25 detects the time position of the impulse signal and provides the remote service unit with the information necessary to align its symbol transmissions with the symbol transmissions of the other remote service units. Further communications between the newly added remote service unit and the head end unit 25 can take place on the upstream and downstream communications channels until the head end unit 25 allocates the transmit and receive bins that are to be assigned to the newly added remote service unit and instructs it accordingly. Once the foregoing has been completed, the head end unit 25 and the newly added remote service unit carry out their standard communications at step 630.

Of further note, although not of particular importance to the improved receiver architecture, is the fact that the present system can be designed to transmit and receive either 4 point constellations or 16 point constellations in a given bin depending on the signal-to-noise ratio in the communications system at the bin frequency. This determination is made by the head end unit 25 and the remote service unit(s) transmitting and/or receiving in that bin are instructed accordingly. In bins having a low signal-to-noise ratio, it is preferable to use 4 point constellations. In bins having a high signal-to-noise ratio, it is preferable to use 16 point constellations.

With the foregoing in mind, it can be seen why the embodiments of the remote service units described herein send and receive data in nine bins, respectively. In high noise conditions, four bins are needed by each of the two phones at the customer site to transmit data and four bins are needed by each of the two phones at the customer site to receive data. A total of eight bins are thus required in high noise conditions for each telephone receiver and transmitter, respectively. The further ninth bin may, for example, be used to facilitate a bin swapping function.

Although the present invention has been described with reference to specific embodiments, those of skill in the art will recognize that changes may be made thereto without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention as set forth in the appended claims.

Claims

1. In a multi-point communications system having a receiver and transmitter disposed at a primary site for communication with a plurality of remote service units disposed at respective secondary sites, the transmitter of the primary site using OFDM/DMT transmissions over a first number of transmission bins to transmit communication data, a receiver for use in one or more remote service units comprising:

first means for converting the analog OFDM/DMT transmissions received from the transmitter of the primary site into digital data;

second means for processing the digital data of the first means for extracting frequency, amplitude, and phase information from the digital data;

third means for limiting the digital data processed by the second means to extract the frequency, amplitude, and phase information to a second number of transmission bins, the second number of transmission bins being a reduced subset of the first number of transmission bins transmitted by the transmitter of the primary site, whereby the receiver digitally processes the reduced subset of bins of the received signal to the exclusion of other bins of the first number of transmission bins.

2. A receiver as claimed in claim 1 and further comprising decoding means for receiving the frequency, amplitude, and phase information from the second means and decoding the information to recover the communication data imposed on the OFDM/DMT signal by the transmitter at the primary site.

3. A receiver as claimed in claim 1 wherein the first means comprises:

an RF frequency conversion circuit connected to receive the OFDM/DMT transmissions that are transmitted by the transmitter of the primary site for converting the received OFDM/DMT transmissions to an intermediate frequency;

an IF-to-digital conversion circuit for receiving the OFDM/DMT transmissions at the intermediate frequency and converting the transmissions to the digital data.

4. A receiver as claimed in claim 1 wherein the second means comprises means for executing a Fourier Transform on the digital data.

5. A receiver as claimed in claim 1 wherein the second means comprises a correlator.

6. A receiver as claimed in claim 1 wherein the third means comprises an analog-to-digital converter disposed in the first means for converting the analog OFDM/DMT transmissions to the digital data at a sampling frequency which results in aliasing of the digital data characteristics thereby to reduce the number of digital data samples processed by the second means.

7. A receiver as claimed in claim 1 wherein the third means comprises a band pass filter disposed in the first means for limiting the number of bins that are converted to generate the digital data to a subset of the first number of bins of the OFDM/DMT transmissions.

8. A multi-point communications system comprising:

a primary transmitter disposed at a primary site, the primary transmitter generating OFDMIDMT transmissions over a first number of transmission bins to transmit communication data;

a plurality of receivers respectively disposed at a plurality of secondary sites;

a transmission medium for transmitting the OFDM/DMT transmissions from the primary transmitter at the primary site to the plurality of receivers disposed at a plurality of secondary sites

each of the plurality of receivers digitally processing a reduced subset of the first number of bins transmitted by the primary transmitter to recover communication data that is transmitted in the reduced subset of the first number of bins to the exclusion of digitally processing other views in the first number of bins.

9. A multi-point communications system as claimed in claim 8 wherein each of the plurality of receivers comprises:

first means for converting the analog OFDM/DMT transmissions received from the transmitter of the primary site into digital data;

second means for processing the digital data of the first means for extracting frequency, amplitude, and phase information from the digital data;

third means for limiting the digital data processed by the second means to a second number of transmission bins, the second number of transmission bins being a reduced subset of the first number of transmission bins transmitted by the transmitter of the primary site.

10. A multi-point communications system as claimed in claim 9 wherein the first

means comprises:

an RF frequency conversion circuit connected to receive the OFDM/DMT transmissions that are transmitted by the transmitter of the primary site for converting the received OFDM/DMT transmissions to an intermediate frequency;

an IF-to-digital conversion circuit for receiving the OFDM/DMT transmissions at the intermediate frequency and converting the transmissions to the digital data.

11. A multi-point communications system as claimed in claim 9 wherein the second means comprises means for executing a Fourier Transform on the digital data.

12. A multi-point communications system as claimed in claim 9 wherein the second means comprises a correlator.

13. A multi-point communications system as claimed in claim 9 wherein the third means comprises an analog-to-digital converter disposed in the first means for converting the analog OFDM/DMT transmissions to the digital data at a sampling frequency which results in aliasing of the digital data characteristics thereby to reduce the number of digital data samples process by the second means.

14. A multi-point communications system as claimed in claim 9 wherein the third means comprises a band pass filter disposed in the first means for limiting the number of bins that are converted to generate the digital data to a subset of the first number of bins of the OFDM/DMT transmissions.

15. A multi-point communications system as claimed in claim 8 and further comprising decoding means for receiving the frequency, amplitude, and phase information from the second means and decoding the information to recover the communication data imposed on the OFDM/DMT signal by the transmitter at the primary site.

16. In a multi-point communications system having a receiver and transmitter disposed at a primary site for communication with a plurality of remote service units disposed at respective secondary sites, the transmitter of the primary site using OFDM/DMT transmissions over a first number of transmission bins to transmit communication data, a receiver for use in one or more remote service units comprising:

analog filter means receiving the first number of transmission bins at an input thereof and providing an analog signal at an output thereof corresponding to a second number of transmission bins, the second number of transmission bins being a subset of the first number of transmission bins and being provided at the output of the analog filter means to the exclusion of other bins in the first number of transmission bins;

an analog-to-digital converter circuit accepting the of the analog filter means and converting the analog OFDMIDMT transmissions of the second number of transmission bins into digital data; and

a digital data processing circuit connected to receive the digital data from the analog-to-digital converter circuit for processing the digital data corresponding to the second number of transmission bins to extract frequency, amplitude, and phase information from the digital data.

17. A receiver as claimed in claim 16 and further comprising a decoder to extract digital data communication intelligence from the frequency, amplitude, and phase information of the digital data output of the digital data processing circuit.

18. A receiver as claimed in claim 16 wherein the analog filter means comprises: a tuner circuit having an input and an output;

an IF converter circuit having an input accepting a signal processed by the tuner circuit; and

a bandpass filter accepting an input signal processed by the IF converter and providing an output signal for subsequent processing by the analog-to-digital converter circuit.

19. In a multi-point communications system having a receiver and transmitter disposed at a primary site for communication with a plurality of remote service units disposed at respective secondary sites, the transmitter of the primary site using OFDM/DMT transmissions over a first number of transmission bins to transmit communication data, a method of extracting intelligent data from the first number of transmission bins comprising the steps of:

receiving the first number of transmission bins at a receiver of the remote service unit;

digitally processing a second number of transmission bins at the receiver to extract frequency, amplitude, and phase characteristics of signals in the second number of bins, the second number of transmission bins being a subset of the first number of transmission bins, the second number of transmission bins being digitally processed to the exclusion of other bins of the first number of transmission bins.

20. A method as claimed in claim 19 and further comprising the step of:

decoding the digitally processed data to extract digital data communication intelligence from the frequency, amplitude, and phase information of the digital data output of the digital data processing circuit.